


you can't play on broken strings

by CharlotteDaBookworm



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Angst, Betrayal, Canon Compliant, Canonical Character Death, Established Relationship, Hurt No Comfort, M/M, Nyx Ulric's Self-Esteem, Pain, no happy ending, or lack thereof
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-14
Updated: 2019-01-14
Packaged: 2019-10-07 07:03:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,194
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17361251
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CharlotteDaBookworm/pseuds/CharlotteDaBookworm
Summary: Nyx glares. “Why?” He screams, and it hurts that he even has to ask. “Tell me why, Titus?!” He just. He needs to know why.Why betray Lucis? Why betray him? Why?Titu-Glauca doesn’t answer, doesn’t even try, just steps forward again, blade ready.





	you can't play on broken strings

**Author's Note:**

> I don't own FFXV. The title of this comes from Broken Strings by James Morrison. I promised not to post this til monday cos angst. Tis monday, so enjoy :)

Someone crouches down beside him and Nyx groans as he forces his aching muscles to comply and lift his head up so that he can see who it is, body tense both from pain and in preparation of an enemy attack.

 

He smiles in relief and relaxes again as he recognises the figure.

 

“Ti,” he breathes, discretion and rules and regulations long forgotten at the sight of his lover; whole and healthy and _here_ , even as the city falls around them. He coughs slightly, wincing and tightening the arm he has pressed against his wounds - stopping him from bleeding out and a part of Nyx still can’t believe this, Luche was his _friend,_ even if he was a bit of a dick, but he was also a traitor and he had shot him and all for _what?_ What was worth betraying their oaths like this? Betraying their home and their people by working for Niflheim like this? - when his abdomen protested the movement painfully.

 

“Nyx,” Titus murmurs quietly in response, on one knee beside him and his worry evident in his voice, one hand reaching out to brush against his face briefly - and, if he leans into the touch, well, who would tell? - and then grasping Nyx’s free one and squeezing it tightly. It’s only long familiarity with the man that lets him see the fear hidden in his eyes, and Nyx grips back as hard as he can - which isn’t very hard, honestly, weakened by blood loss as he is - in an attempt to reassure him. It doesn’t work. “You alright, Ulric?” He asks briskly, seemingly uncaring for all that he clutches Nyx’s hand tighter, and Nyx smirks tiredly up at him.

 

“Never better, Captain.”

 

The Captain of the Kingsglaive smiles minutely, the faintest hint of relief in his expression at Nyx’s cocky response, and gives his hand one last squeeze as he glances ahead of Nyx; where he can hear the Princess and Luc-Lazarus but not see them because of the fucking bullet in his chest. “Good.” He stands, once again his superior officer instead of his lover.

 

But Titus doesn’t have time to take more than a single step before Luche **_screams_** in agony - and Nyx knows, instinctively, what’s happening to him, despite being unable to move enough to actually _see,_ and he would never have wished it upon him, despite the fact that he was a traitor, despite the harshly spoken words that still echoed in his head.

 

_(“please, Ulric, we all know that the only reason you haven’t been court-martialled is that you’re fucking the Captain. You must be a damn good lay to get away with disobeying orders so often.”)_

 

He would never have wanted him to _burn_ like this, no matter what he had done, no matter what he said. Nobody deserved to suffer like that. Nyx closes his eyes briefly, listening to the dying screams of a man he’d thought a friend, and allows himself a moment to _regret_ and _grieve_ before he pushes it all away.

 

It isn’t the time for regret.

 

Nor is it the time for grief.

 

Not with the city falling and the people dying and the mission still to complete.

 

The screams cut off and, for a moment, silence echoes.

 

Then, a car revs and Nyx doesn’t have time to turn before it _slams_ into Titus at nearly full speed and it’s all he can do to _watch_ as his lover flies backwards, pushed by the still moving car, and his yell of surprise catches in his throat as he finally clocks the driver.

 

His heart skips a beat.

 

 _Not Libs_ , he prays desperately to Ramuh, to Leviathan, to Titan, to any that would listen. Luche- Lazarus was bad enough, Nyx doesn’t know what he would do if Libertus, his best friend, his _brother,_ was a traitor. Libs wouldn’t. He _wouldn’t_. No matter how angry he was over Crowe’s death, no matter how much they all hated how Lucis treated them, he wouldn’t. _Libs can’t be a traitor. He_ can’t _._

 

It doesn’t matter that Nyx could _see_ him, behind the wheel of the car. Doesn’t matter that he can’t think of any explanation why Libs would purposely drive into Titus; into the _Captain_. Libs wasn’t a traitor, he _wasn’t_.

 

_There has to be a reason for this._

 

Trembling, bloody hand still pressed tightly against his stomach, Nyx tries to stand - desperate to make sure that his lover was still okay, to demand answers from his brother; he can’t lose anyone else, not today, not now.

 

And then the car goes flying and his heart **_stops_**.

 

 _No,_ he thinks.

 

“No,” he whispers hoarsely, unable to take his eyes off of where the Captain had stood; searching desperately for his lover and finding only General Glauca - finding only the figure who had murdered King Regis right in front of him, the figure of Galahd’s nightmare, slaughterer of his people. It can’t- Titus couldn’t be- no. “ _No,_ ” Nyx breathes, shaking his head, not able to believe it.

 

Not _wanting_ to believe it.

 

“Captain?” He asks, voice rough and shaky with horror and pain and heart-wrenching disbelief. _Titus?_ He means but can’t quite bring himself to say.

 

To say it, to call that monster by his lover’s name, would be too much like accepting it and he doesn’t - _can’t_ \- believe what he’s seeing.

 

Glauca tilts its head, stalking towards him, and Nyx _can’t_ …

 

Titus can’t be a traitor. Can’t be _Glauca_. Not the that he loves more than anything. Not the man who had held him as he _sobbed_ for Crowe, who had been there when he collapsed and broken because he’d lost a second sister. Not the man who always offered a prayer for his mother and his sister, who talked about his lost home with sad eyes, who couldn’t stand spicy food but tried to eat it anyway. Not the smug bastard who Nyx had never managed to beat in a spar, who smirked down at him whenever he pinned Nyx to the mats. Not the man who told him he loved him with soft eyes. That man wasn’t the one who had killed the King with no hesitation, wasn’t the monster that had slaughtered its way across Galahd, killing so many of Nyx’s people - so many _children_ , bodies tossed aside like they were nothing. Titus can’t be that monster.

 

Nyx can’t believe that.

 

_(Titus had brought up them maybe adopting a kid just that very morning, what with the treaty and the war dying down and them both having an actual chance of living long enough to raise a kid now. He’d been so quiet, so unsure in the way he only allowed himself to be when they were alone, as he’d asked and the way that his face had lit up when Nyx had agreed because he’d always wanted kids, the way that he’d peppered his face with kisses and whispered his love and…_

 

_That couldn’t have been fake. That man, the man he loved, wasn’t a traitor._

 

 _He_ wasn’t _)_

 

The princess is there, then, crouching behind him and clutching at the same hand that Titus had been mere moments before, and he has to protect her - his King had ordered it of him and Nyx was nothing if not loyal, even to a dead man - but Glauca is still approaching and Nyx can’t stand, he’s dying, and he doesn’t want to believe it, not even when all the evidence is shoving itself in his face.

 

Libertus screams his name but he can’t look away from certain death stalking towards him; Nyx hadn’t been able to take Glauca hours before, when he was relatively uninjured and still had the Kings magic, he stands no chance now.

 

“It’s over,” Glauca says and Nyx’s heart breaks in two.

 

Because he _knows_. Because, now that he’s listening for it, he can hear the echoes of Titus behind the voice modifier in the helm. Because he can’t deny it anymore, no matter that he wants to. Tears of rage and pain and grief and _heartbreak_ spring to his eyes, but Nyx refuses to let them fall.

 

Not for _him._

 

 _Not for a traitor_.

 

“The daemons are unleashed. Lucis is fallen. Surrender the Ring.” Glauca- _Titus_ orders and Nyx just can’t take it anymore.

 

“Why?” He asks quietly, and he _knows_ that Ti-Glauca can hear him _(he’d always had ears like a bat, he’d never succeeded in sneaking up on him no matter how he tried and the memory of that_ burns _now)_ but he gets no response, not even a look. Glauca keeps his attention firmly on the Princess and all it does it make him angry. “Look at me.” He demands, forcing himself so that he’s vaguely upright and moving in front of his charge so that Glauca has no choice. “Look at me!”

 

Finally, Glauca does.

 

Nyx glares. “ _Why?”_ He screams, and it _hurts_ that he even has to ask. “Tell me _why_ , Titus?!” He just. He needs to know _why_.

 

Why betray Lucis? Why betray _him_? Why?

 

Titu-Glauca doesn’t answer, doesn’t even _try_ , just steps forward again, blade ready.

 

And then there is a ring, and a reckless idea, and a deal is struck, and Nyx is left to fight against someone that he had never wished to raise a blade to as, around them, the city continues to fall and Libertus rushes Princess Lunafreya to safety.

 

He fights, even as his heart shatters, because he can do nothing else.

 

Hours later, as dawn approaches, Nyx falls to his knees in front of a man that he still loves - despite everything that he was, despite everything that he’d _done_. _(And Nyx hates himself for that. For the fact that he still loves this man - this traitor, this_ monster _\- when it should be so much easier just to_ hate _)_.

 

“For the honour of my home,” Glauca - not Titus, even if it was his face this wasn’t the Titus that Nyx had fallen in love with - begins, looming above him and, staring at that familiar face, Nyx can’t help but wish that he hadn’t broken that mask. “I fought and killed under a king I _loathed_. And _still_ , he betrayed me. He betrayed us all.”

 

He forces himself to his feet, ignoring the pain as he pulled on his wounds, as magic burns through his veins like acid, because this wasn’t the end. Not yet.

 

Even though he wishes it could be.

 

“We fought for the same thing, all of us!” He says, his voice steady, and the words are tired; he has no anger left, now, it’s all burned out, leaving only exhaustion and grief and a gaping emptiness where his heart should be. “But you’ve looked too long on the past and are blind to the future.”

 

Nyx warps and they clash again, and it _hurts,_ still, but he knows that nothing will hurt more than when he looked the man he loved in the eyes and saw only a monster.

 

He’s wrong.

 

 _(Because, of course, he is. He’s been wrong about so many things. He’s been so_ blind _)_

 

What hurts the most is the blade that he slides into Titus’ chest, a mortal wound he knows at once, and it feels like a wound inflicted on himself. He then steps back to watch as the King-killer collapses to the rubble at their feet. That hurts far more than any mortal wound, than any heartbreak, and he wishes that it didn’t.

 

Nyx collapses alongside him, legs no longer able to bear his weight.

 

The tears that stream silently down his face - and he didn’t think he could still cry, after everything, after today - have little to do with the pain of his various wounds, nor the agony of the magic raging through every cell of his body, killing him more quickly with every second that passed. “Was- Was any of it real?” He asks softly, choking on a sob halfway through and hating himself even more for the weakness. He doesn’t really want to know, not really, but he’s dying, and Titus is dying and he _needs to know_.

 

Silence is his only answer.

 

Nyx looks away.

 

He laughs through his tears, the sound bitter on his tongue. Yeah, he should have guessed. Of course, it wasn’t real.

 

He’d just been a means to an end to Titus. A cover.

 

How happy it must have made him; a naïve, _loyal_ , Glaive who was already half in love with him, who would never doubt his loyalty. The perfect cover and a plaything all at once. Nyx laughs again, unable to believe how stupid he’d been.

 

Letting himself fall backwards, away from the man - the _traitor_ \- that he had asked to marry him - who had said _yes_ and kissed him so softly and had looked so fucking _happy_ \- he laughs and he laughs and he laughs, even as the sun breaches the horizon and his skin flakes away.

 

It was just his luck, really. Nyx should have known that it wasn’t real. That it had all been fake, just a piece of fiction. He should have known.

 

After all, who would ever love him?

**Author's Note:**

> Did Titus actually love him? Maybe.
> 
> But Nyx will never know, not for sure. And it's - easier, to believe that none of it was ever real, that it was all just a part of Titus' mission. It hurts a little less, when Nyx can convince himself of that; when he can force himself to forget the good parts and remember that the Titus Nyx knew, the Titus he loved, had never existed. Because Titus Drautos had never loved him.
> 
> (He did, is the thing. Titus loved Nyx.
> 
> It wasn't a part of his mission, wasn't just to solidify his cover, wasn't some sort of elaborate scheme. Somewhere along the way, Titus fell in love with this reckless glaive who tried to save everyone and he could never quite bring himself to regret that, even at the end. Titus loved him, cared for him, and when he said yes to marrying Nyx it was because of that fact and no other. His happiness, his love, their relationship, it was all genuine, not fake. 
> 
> He loved Nyx and yet, it changed nothing.
> 
> Because, sometimes, love just isn't enough)


End file.
